


December in Dunwall

by Kleiner_Ghost



Category: Dishonored (Video Games), Prey (Video Game 2017)
Genre: Crossover, Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Female Morgan Yu, Morgan Yu Is A Typhon, No Romance, Other
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-16
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-14 08:26:56
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 7,977
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28792416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kleiner_Ghost/pseuds/Kleiner_Ghost
Summary: Typhon Morgan failed the simulation. And that should have been the end of her. However, she found herself in a boat, drifting though a place that science could not explain.It was a void. A void filled with floating islands, ruins and whales. And the strangest of them all, a man with eyes as black as a starless sky. He made Morgan an offer she could not refuse.Corvo had been tasked with abducting the royal physician, Anton Sokolov. The task seemed easy enough at first; that was until a squad of novel ennemies showed up. Tallboys were hard enough to deal with on their own, but impossible to escape when several of them were gathered together.Corvo was ready to part ways with life, when help came from in an unexpected way.
Relationships: Morgan You & Corvo Attano
Kudos: 7





	1. Drawbridge Way

Corvo clenched his fist and aimed his blink at the rooftop of the house across the street. He was almost at his goal, a safehouse at North End. But before that, he had to cross Kaldwin's bridge and that would prove to be a challenge.

Corvo released his hand, and instantly found himself on the opposite roof. He leaned over its edge, observing the street below.

There were more guards than usual. Hell, there were more guards than he'd ever seen even during the darkest days of Dunwall. Something was wrong, and it had nothing to do with the dozens of guards the ex-lord-protector had sent to the afterlife the previous few days.

No, something was amiss. Corvo was now certain of it.

He pulled out the flesh heart out of his breast pocket. How that thing fit in there remained a mystery to everyone but its creator. Corvo gently sqeezed the magical device, and it hummed its melody in a distorted female voice :

"Many seek the Bridge for solace. Ruined men, abandoned women, and plague victims have all leapt from here."

Corvo rolled his eyes. That much he new already. He tried pointing the heart in a few other directions, but he got nothing more out of it apart from another nonchalant whisper :

"The air is heavy and stale. Some acrid powders still linger in it."

"No more runes in this area then." Corvo muttered under his breath. He was about to put the heart away and blink onto the next roof, when something glistened in the water. Intrigued, he pointed the arcane instrument in the direction of the sea. 

"This water was once clear until men raced to the stars and were met by those who language they spoke not. They thought they were gods, but they tarnished the water with their mortal blood."

Corvo shook his head and put the heart away. Its words were getting more and more cryptic by the second. Although it did seem as if something metal had been exposed by retreating waves.

The man readied his power and waited for all guards to look away. The ledge he was aiming for was a storey lower than where he was now. He opened his fist, and as time slowed down around him, he found himself on a small ledge. From there, he pulled himself upwards, into an open window.

A pleading cry of a dying weeper came from a corner of the room. As silent as ever, Corvo extended his blade, and empaled the creature before it had had the time to face him. As it slid of his blade, Corvo closed its eyes with a swift hand gesture. He was not fond of killing civilians, but he believed that his blade brought mercy to those infected by the plague.

*Cling* 

The distinct noise of metal hitting against cobblestone came from the street Corvo had just left. Instinctively, he ducked so as to be hidden under the window, and peaked outside. 

"I will damned." He swore.

Before him, a structure of metal made its way down the street. It had two long legs, that supported a guard wielding a long bow. It looked like a nightmarish deformed spider. A shiver ran down Corvo's spine. How was he supposed to take care of those things ? Could he sneak past them ? How come Samuel had not informed him of whatever the hell the Overseer had built in his absence ?

*Cling, Clang*  
*Cling, Clang* 

The metal guard made such a distinct sound as it walked past Corvo's hiding spot. The man quickly pulled out the flesh heart, in hopes that it might give him a miracle solution.

"They are burning the whales." The female voice whispered.

"As useless as ever." Corvo hissed at the arcane object, as if it were able to hear him.

"This city is built on the bones of the great ones." it whispered in response, its voice splitting and echoing in Corvo's mind.

The clicketing sound grew distant, and Corvo prepared to aim his next blink. If he were to drop above those metal guards, he hoped he could cut through their neck in a single move. 

It turned around the corner and Corvo blinked to the rooftop he had come from. 

"Hey !" Someone yelled below, but Corvo paid no attention to it.

He leaped of the rooftop, and extended his retractable blade just as he was about to land onto the archer who piloted that strange metal puppet. His blade pieced though the back of the guard's neck and Corvo slid to the ground.

"Get him!" Another guard yelled as the metal archer lumped downwards.

Corvo swiftly avoided it, and readied himself for another blink. As he did so, something exploded just above his head. His vision went blurry for a second.

*Cling, Clang.*

"Don't move ! We have orders to bring you in alive."

Corvo's vision went back into focus and his face twisted in horror under his mask. Before him, stood two more of those metal guards. They had come from the bridge, unaffected by that wall of light Corvo was trying so hard to avoid.

Four guards had gathered around him, their blades and pistols ready. He had only one way out, a balcony to his left, where he had taken down that first archer. He would blink over his corpse, and onto the balcony. Or at least that was the plan until a third creature peaked into the road Corvo was on.

"Okay, new plan." He thought and raised his hand to blink upwards. 

"I said don't move !" A bullet hit Corvo in the chest pushing him backwards, against a metal shutter. Thankfully most of the damage was blocked by his vest, not that guns of this era did much damage to begin with.

Upwards was not an option. He was running low on ideas. Meanwhile, the archers were closing in. An arrow from this distance would no doubt be lethal.

"Lord Regnant said to get you alive. There's a cell waiting for you at Kindsparrow Island," one of the archers spoke. 

"Don't know why, but they want you alive. Shame really, but that doesn't mean we can't have some fun before we send you of." Another archer continued.

"Put down your weapons !" One of the foot soldiers ordered.

"I'm sorry Emily." Corvo whispered as he reached for a razor mine. He was not going to let himself be taken to prison once more. Even if this meant facing that trator. Emily was safe and that's all the mattered.

"Get back!" One of the guard's yelled to his comrades as the mine hit the ground. 

For a millisecond, none of them moved, not daring to trigger the device. Then suddenly one of the archers raised its bow and preformed a 180 turn before shooting at his friend. The mine activated as the foot soldiers moved around in panick. Corvo braves himself to meet his maker when he felt a gloved hand touch the back of his head. He turned around to grab the wrist of that coward who had snicked behind him, but his hand suddenly felt so heavy, so, so heavy. He tried leaning against the window to regain his balance, but was met with nothing.

He fell inside an empty room. That window was closed a few seconds ago, he was sure of it. Something moved in the corner of his vision. A person dressed in red and black. He reached for his crossbow, but was hit with a blow to the head. Except nothing had actually hit him. Not physically at least.

His vision started going dark. The last thing Corvo Saw before passing out was a ball of light exploding and bringing the three archers to the ground.


	2. Crossing Paths

Morgan was frantically pacing around in a tiny baren room. In one corner, laid an unconscious man. A man who who had needed two 'mindjacks' and a 'psychoshosk' to get in his current state. At the opposite end of the room, a trap door led to the sewers where Morgan had crawled from. 

Thankfully her Transtar unifor was waterproof enough to prevent her from getting any of the plague-ridden fluids onto herself. The suit could do nothing about the smell though.

After taking care of the turrets, or whatever those long-legged things were, Morgan had barricaded herself within the room she was currently stuck in. Of course, the sewers remained an option. 

"Always an option." She thought to herself.

Since coming to this strange city, she had done nothing more than crawl through sewers and mind-control guards she could not sneak past. But at least she was no longer running in a hamster wheel for the greatest entertainment of her brother. And jellified eels tasted the same here as they did on Talos, she tried to reassure herself.

The man laying on the ground winced, and stirred about. Instinctively, Morgan made a quick hand gesture, a semi-complete circle, with her left hand. She had gotten quite used to switching abilities that way.

With a disruptor gun in one hand, and a 'lift field' ready to fire, she was ready to greet her newly found comapion.

The man opened his eyes and instantly rose from the floor, reaching over his back for his crossbow. His hand met thin air. He reached towards his belt for his retractable blade, but that too was gone. A pile of weapons, once Corvo's, laid a few feet behind Morgan.

"Who are you supposed to be?" He barked at the woman, finally noticing where his equipment had been dumped.

"I return the greeting." Morgan said, without putting away the gun.

The man tried to take a few steps forward, but Morgan let out a warning "uh, uh". Green sparks flew around her extended left hand. Somewhere in the back of her mind, Morgan knew that the worst she could do to a man who survived her psychic attack was to slow him down just long enough for her to run away, but she wasn't about to let that stop her.

"Okay fine." The man almost spat each word. He had had a rough day. He raised his hands next to his head to show goodwill. "Not every encounter I have needs to end in bloodshed." He muttered.

Morgan wasn't sure if that was threat or not, but she put away her gun in an attempt to seem more civil.

"You have that mark on your wrist. The Outsider, a creepy floating man with black eyes, told me to seek out those with his blessing. He said that you would help me on my quest."

Corvo scuffed.

"I don't expect you to, of course. I know it's a lot to ask. But I've helped you out back there, with the turrets, so I was thinking maybe you could help me out too?" Morgan asked.

The realisation of what she was doing had began to sink in. She was cornering a complete stranger into helping her under the pretext of both of them being linked to the Outsider. It started to look much like those times Chief Elazar cornered Morgan into fighting the Typhon for her.

"And what is it you want ?" Corvo crossed his arms over his chest.

"I need to find a man. Doctor Sokolov." Morgan answered.


	3. Skip the Introductions

Corvo's initial impression of the woman that greeted him when he woke up hadn't been so great. In his defence, she did start the conversation by pointing a weapon he did not recognize at him and threatened him with a mysterious power.

But she seemed more willing to talk now that he admitted he was on his way to meet Sokolov as well. He left out the part about his actual mission. Although this woman knew of the Outsider, it did not make her trustworthy.

"So do you have a plan ?" She asked after returning his belongings to Corvo.

"The plan was to sneak past the guard's without causing a commotion. But..." He trailed of, recalling the events that unfolded a few hours prior.

"Sorry about that. I guess I could have waited it out." Morgan attempted an apology. Truth be told, she didn't feel sorry whatsoever. But she had learned that people liked this kind of sucking up.

"Don't be. I would've been a goner if not for those tricks you pulled of." Corvo said as he peaked though the gap between the now closed window shutters.

At the foot of the house they were hiding in, laid a small pile of corpses. None of the newly arrived guards had yet bothered to move their fallen comrades. Corvo shook his head. This only meant more weepers.

He leaned back when he suddenly felt a throbbing pain at the back of his skull.

"Hey girl, what did you do ?" He turned to face the woman.

Morgan looked up from the opposite end of the room. She was about to close the trapdoor that led to the sewers and wasn't quite sure what the man meant.

"You mean to the turrets ? 'Kinetic blast'. I didn't want to waste an EMP grenade on them." She answered before dropping the trap door closed.

"No I mean to my head." Corvo winced to make his headache look worse than it was.

He had learned that people tended to reveal their true self when they felt as if they had someone else at their mercy. That wasn't to say that his vision did not go blurry for a split second.

He watched as the woman's face twisted into an expression of guilt. She unclipped something of her shoulders, it wasn't a backpack per say, and judging by the dull sound it made when hitting the floor, it was made of something rather heavy.

"I have pills that can help with a concussion." She pulled out a small bottle of pills from a side compartiment of her strange backpack.

To Corvo's greatest surprise, she sounded almost apologetic. But he wasn't ready to let the issue slide.

"Since both of us are after the same man, I believe we should make a few things clear first." Corvo said. Truth be told, he should have had this discussion before agreeing to help that woman.

"Here." She gave him a pill before putting the bottle away. "You are right. We should set a few things straight."

Corvo examiner the bluish piece of medecine before lifting his mask and swallowing it. His head felt lighter almost immediately.

"You could make a good profit, were you to sell your recipe to the overseers." He thought out loud.

"Oh, I'm not the one who came up with those. Pharmaceuticals aren't my strong point..." Morgan trailed of. 

Morgan's strong point, as she'd just put it, was neuroscience. Morgan had a doctorate from the Periot College School of Science that she'd put in a neat golden frame back on Earth.

That Morgan was not the person who had blown Talos 1 to pieces over and over again in an attempt to escape a virtual simulation. No, the person now standing in front of Corvo was not that Morgan. But she was *a* Morgan and she did not want to go into details.

"Eitherway, as you saw I can hold my own against a few cops so I won't slow you down, if that's what you're worried about. And with that arsenal you carry, I doubt you'll slow me down either." Morgan gestured at the array of weapons and ammo Corvo had on display.

Corvo, whose migraine had completely vanished, finally took the time to examine the person before him. She was only a few inches shorter than him, her hair was dark, and her eyes were slightly slanted. And yet, her sharp cheekbones, pale complexion and dark circles under her eyes were all proof that she was in less than ideal shape.

Corvo had heard tales of elixir addicted whalers living on nothing but said elixirs, disregarding fatigue, hunger, and any other human need. He frowned at the idea that this woman might have fallen into a similar addiction.

"So, do you have a plan or should we just make a run for it ? Because that was my plan before you showed up." Morgan said. She crossed her arms over her chest, tired of waiting.

"That is a terrible plan," Corvo answered, "but I'm afraid I can't suggest anything better. Initially I was trying to sneak past them. But that was before they doubled and trippled the number of guards, and before those - things - showed up." He quickly glanced at the pile of limbs and metal barely visible through the closed blinds.

"Yeah, those turrets are a pain in the ass. I don't know what kind of sensors they have, but they don't discriminate between human and," Morgan cut herself short. She was about to say Typhon, but she did not want to ge into a lengthy explanation. "And those zombie people-things," she continued.

"Weepers ?" 

"Is that what they are called ? Eitherway, I saw one of them shoot some civilians from well over a hundred meters. Shouldn't even had had a line of sight, as Elazar would say. And you can't run under them, they'll just impale you with their legs." Morgan finished summerising her observations.

"You seem to be well aquatinted with, turrets, you call them?"

"I don't know what they're actually called." Morgan made her way to the window and peaked through the blinds. She could see a few guards, and another turret standing still in front of a wall of light.

"They could be called 'daddy long legs' for all we know, eh ?" She attempted to lighten the mood.

Corvo remained silent.

"That wasn't even a jest." He finally said.

Morgan made a scuffing sound of someone who's jokes were not appreciated enough, leading Corvo to smile, just a bit, under his mask.

"If I can get close enough, I can 'mindjack' the turret for a minute. That should give me enough time to hack thought the electric wall.

A heavy silence fell as both people observed and memorised the patters that the guards outdoors walked along.

Finally, Corvo spoke.

"If by 'mindjack' you mean how that archer turned against his comrades earlier, then I suggest that I distract them while you sprint across that street to get to the wall of light. There, you mind control the turret, and hide. I will take care of the wall of light." Corvo suggested.

Morgan nodded. Although she wasn't used to receiving help from other people, that plan did sound better to her. Safer too.

"How are you going to get to safety ? The turret might missfire, and you might be in danger if you stay in melee range of the guards."

"You have your tricks, I have mine." Corvo showed her the mark on his left wrist, not without a spark of pride.

"Then -"

"One last thing," Corvo cut Morgan short. "The wall of light will harm us, but not the city watch. This means that reinforcements can come from the other side. Here," he unclipped the gun from its hinge on the leather belt running across his chest. Holding it by the baril, je offered the weapon to his companion.

"It's alright, a have a less lethal solution." The woman patted a massive red canon strapped to her back. It had previously been laying on the floor, but even now Corvo could not guess its purpose.

He shook his head. "That might not cut it."

"I also have a gun." Morgan patted the silver weapon, lodged in its holster over her hip.

Corvo sigh. If she insisted, he was not going to argue over it.

"Then on my mark -" 

"Ready when you are."

Two guards crossed the wall of light into the street that laid before the house Corvo and Morgan were hiding in. One of them turned to the left, towards the pier, while the other carried on idly walking. It was as if they were oblivious to the pile of corpses that laid only a few dozen meters ahead of them. Then again, this was Dunwall. Corpses littering the streets were not an unusual sight. 

When the guard came close enough to their hiding spot, Corvo whispered : "Now."


	4. The Battle

"Now." The man ordered.

He and Morgan simultaneously slammed the binds opened and jumped throug the window. He charged towards the guard, who had yet to pull out his sword, while Morgan sprinted past them.

"Stop! Someone ring the alarm !" The guard yelled. A sound of clashing swords followed, and Morgan did not look back.

As she ran, she was looking upwards, trying to figure out if the turret had spotted her or not. Sure enough; it make a creaking sound, and took one step towards her. 

She drew a quick circle with her left hand, 'phantom shifting' a dozen meters ahead. She did that not a second too early, since an arrow hit the shadowy figure that had replaced her.

"Witchcraft !" Yelled one of the foot soldiers.

It seemed as Morgan's ally had yelled something as well, but she paid no attention to it. A purple cloud of energy gathered around the turret, and in an instant, it was already spinning around to face the remaining guards.

Corvo's prediction had been correct. Three more guards came running though the electric wall, just as the turret fired its first arrow in their direction.

"Assassin !" One of them yelled and ran towards Morgan. 

She 'mindjacked' him as well before resuming her sprint towards the electric wall.

In the corner of her vision, she noticed as two more guards emerged from within an alleyway, but a gunshot made them turn in Corvo's direction.

As Morgan approched the wall of light, she pulled out her gloo canon and quickly made a few leges that allowed her to climb onto the adjacent watchtower. She could have used 'lift field' to achieve the same result, bit she was running low on psychic energy. Without the help of psy hypos (which she was also running low on) or science operators, she had to rely on her natural psy regeneration abilities.

"Hey!" A guard yelled and was promptly greeted with a wrench swing. He fell unconscious to the floor. 

Morgan took a quick look around. She was in a small square room, with one window overlooking the residential area she had just come from. A second opening in the wall, opposite where Morgan had come from, led to a short boulevard ending with heavy iron gates. The bridge was closed off.

Making note of all that information, Morgan returned her attention to her newly found comapion. He was fending off two guards, blade in one hand and pistol in the other. Never before had Morgan seen a gun be used as a male weapon.

The strident sound of metal grincing against pavement as the turret spun on itself snapped Morgan back to reality.

With a reluctant heist, she reached out for her Q-beam gun and aimed it at the turret. As it fired its arrow, she hid away from the window. The impact from its explosive arrow made her jerk away from the wall. She almost fell over, but caught herself on the window ledge. She leaned outside and fired the beam weapon again. The turret walked towards her at an alarming speed, but its surface started crackling with veins of green energy. Its pilot aimed another arrow at Morgan. 

Just as the turret stopped and its pilot took his aim, a green aura surrouneded it, and the machine blew to bits. What little metal parts remained dropped to the ground, signaling that the main fight was over.

Corvo had kept an eye on the situation, as much as his opponents would allow. Thankfully, when what was left of the archer hit the ground, the last guard facing Corvo got momentarily distracted, leaving an opening.

Corvo slid his blade righ through the guard's neck, before shoving him backwards with his foot.

"Damn it. More rat food." He swore more at himself than anyone else.

"Hey!" Morgan yelled from her watchtower. "I think that's all of them."

Corvo nodded and made his way towards the woman, making sure to grab any loose change or bullets on his way there.

Morgan saw her new companion partake in what was essentially looting. She shook her head with a smirk. There had been a time on Talos when she'd resorted to that as well.

She let out a sigh of relief. The battle was over. For the time being at least.


	5. Filling in the Gaps

Corvo slowly made his way towards the wall of light. Now that all the guard's in a radius of what seemed to be the entire neighborhood were dead or as good as, he had no reason to hurry or sneak over the rooftops.

"You missed a coin there." Morgan yelled from her watchtower.

"Where?" Corvo looked at where the woman was pointing. 

There was nothing there, that he could see. He looked back at her and raised his hands in a questioning manner. At that the woman snickered.

"If you climb up here, I can make us a way down."

Corvo looked at the suspicious clumps of white material stuck against the wall. He shook his head and made his way towards the whale oil storage tank. He pulled the container out and the wall of light powered down with a plaintive electrical buzz.

"I guess that works too." Morgan said before climbing down her ladder of GLOOO.

"You do know that shit is highly explosive, right ?" She asked Corvo as soon as she was down. She suspected that he did, being a permanent resident of this world and all that, but she wanted to make sure, for her own peace of mind.

"Highly." Corvo nodded, partonising her.

"Hey, it's your hands you're putting at risk by carrying that thing around." The woman shrugged and took a wide step to her left, so as to not be as close to her companion in case he accidentally dropped the container.

They carried on walking in silence for a few minutes. Before them, the dark metalic scaffolding of Dunwall Bridge loomed over the darkening sky. Its floodlights were illuminating brightly the even surface of estuary waters.

"So this Sokolov persona," Morgan attempted to start a conversation. "What does he look like ?"

Corvo thought for a minute. 

"He is a man of great talent. He has painted many great figures, including the late empress. He is also known for upgrading all security systems in Dunwall. That wall of light back there, you have him to thank for it." Corvo explained.

"Physically speaking," he continued, "he's about this tall, has chatin hair and a somewhat unkept beard."

He was about to add how surprised he was that this woman hadn't heard of perhaps the greatest natural philosopher of this generation, but decided against it.

"And what happened to that empress you mentioned, I keep hearing people talking about it, how the city has gone to hell, sorry to *the void* ever since she passed." Morgan asked. 

Corvo stopped right in his tracks.

"Oh," Morgan realised that maybe that might have been somewhat of a delicate subject. Afterall, everyone in this town seemed to love the late empress, and there was no reason for this mysterious man to be an exception. "Sorry, I didn't mean to hit a nerve or anything. I was trying to make conversation. I get that people in this town really attached to the empress and all that..." Morgan trailed off, not sure if she was making the situation better or worse.

Corvo shook his head and continued walking.

"Where was it you said you were from again ?" He asked just as he passed by the woman.

"Karnaka ?"

"Are you asking me ?"

"Well I am new in town," Morgan began her explanation. She wasn't sure how much details she should share. "I came here three days ago, that much isn't a lie."

Corvo turned around and gave her a doubtful look, although his mask hid it from the woman's veiw.

"So yeah, I'm not from round here, and that's actually why I'm looking to meet Anton Sokolov. I was told he was the closest thing to a physicist you guys got." 

"You mean a physician ?" Corvo asked. Truly, he should have questioned the woman more before he agreed to help her.

"No," Morgan shook her head and ran her hand through her hair. "No, I mean a physicist. Someone who studies the world around them, like why things fall or how energy can be transferred from one material to another."

Corvo didn't follow. He wasn't sure if this was something he was meant to spend effort on understanding. 

"And how does Sokolov fit into all of this ?" He asked before gesturing to his companion to follow him. They still had a fair bit of a walk before they'd get to the bridge.

"Well the Outsider told me to find him, and that he'd be able to help me with some, umm, family matters ? My brother," Morgan paused. Alex wasn't really her brother, but she was already giving away too many details.

"My brother," she continued, "he's stuck in a place between space and time, it's hard to explain. I believe Sokolov could help him to get out, or could help me to get in, to then get him out."

"The void." Corvo said before gesturing for the woman to stop.

"Pardon ?"

"That place you speak of, where neither time nor space exist. Where if you fall downwards, you will land where you stood, and where there is no sky or land."

They had come at a stop in front of a heavy metal gate. Since it was now past curfew, the gate was shut closed. Corvo kneeled against the cold metal to take a peak through the keyhole. As far as he was aware, this was the only way onto the bridge itself.

"You said you've met the Outsider, the place he resides in is the Void." The man finished his explanation.

He then proceeded to pull out the keys he'd taken off the fallen guards and check each of them against the keyhole.

"All I remember seeing there was a floating whale." Morgan shrugged. She was happy enough that this man was buying her story. That rarely happened back on Talos, where people either thought she was crazy, evil, brain-dammaged or a combination of all three.

Corvo pushed a key into the door, and turned it. It clicked, indicating that the gates were now open.

"Shall we do this one in a more discreet way?" He asked.

"I don't see any sewers. And I can tell from experience that there are some huge-ass fish in that water."

Corvo smirked. 

"Have you ever tried this approach called 'sneaking by' ?"

"Yeah," Morgan could feel sarcasm slipping through that man's mask. "But most Typhon react to mouvement, so I can be hidden all I want it's not -" she cut herself short. This was not the time not place to go on about extraterrestrial organisms.

"Just do as I do." Corvo crouched before disappearing behind the gate.

Morgan sigh. She had regained enough psy to 'phantom shift' across a good portion of the bridge. She could make it if she really tried. But perhaps that man had a point. After being stuck on Talos for as long as she had been, she had gotten too used to running through the station, straight to the points or objects that would trigger the next event. Every time she was hoping for the simulation to end. Now, she wasn't sure what was real anymore.

She saw a bottle roll in front of the door. Her companion must have gotten impatient.

With a smirk, Morgan made a quick gesture with her left hand, selecting a new power. Maybe this stealth approach wasn't going to be so bad afterall.


	6. Treasure hunt part 1

The glass bottle Corvo had nudged towards the gates rolled back and hit against his foot with a dull *thump*.

The man leaned over the crates his was hiding behind in an attempt to peak through the ajar gates. His newly found companion was nowhere to be seen. 

'maybe something happened to her' he caught himself thinking.

"I recon we're meant to go this way, so you can stop scouting the area we just came from." Morgan spoke.

She had just retransformed into her human form and was finding the confusion of her companion rather amusing.

"By the void ! How did you get here ?" Corvo asked, turning around to face the woman.

"Stealth." The woman smirked and hid her face behind her hands. " I bet you didn't even hear me crawl behind you."

Corvo shook his head. 

"Let's go." He said. 

He readied his 'blink' power and the arcane symbol burned into his left hand glowed eerily. Right before teleporting away, Corvo gave a quick glance to the gate he had come through. An empty green glass bottle was laying in front of it. 

Corvo 'blinked' behind a skip, just under an occupied building. From there, he spend a few minutes observing the guards and their patterns. Most of them stayed at their posts, but two did walk up and down the main alley. 

Corvo spotted a narrow passage right by the water and after using his 'dark vision' be noted that the house behind him was empty. 

He 'blinked' onto the balcony of said house and tried opening the door. To no one's surprise, it did not budge. A distant whisper, its melody seemingly muffled by a thick balket of water, came from the pocket where Corvo kept the Heart.

He took the object out and saw that there was a rune nearby. Another one was located across the street, and a few bonecharms were present close by the hiding spot of his companion. He was about to squeeze the Heart in hopes of getting some usefull information, when something hit the back of his head.

He turned around and, while still hiding behind the balcony's ledge, picked up a small blue projectiles. It looked like a crossbow bolt, but was made of a squishy material the man did not recognize.

Another bolt bounced off Corvo's mask. He peaked over the balcony and saw his companion half hidden behind a row of crates with a crossbow in hand. 

He made a few gestures, telling her to wait while he secured in the building behind him. Then it came to Corvo's mind that this woman was unlikely to know the sign language used by royal guards. For a second, his mind went blank as he tried to think of another way of passing his point across. 

Yet another flexifoam bolt struck him out of his stupor. Morgan, using what little she knew of tactical hand gestures told then man that she understood and that she'll wait there. 

Corvo nodded and 'blinked' to the opposite building. He planned of getting that rune first before attempting to break into the other house.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For those of you who aren't from the UK, a skip is a giant bin container. I'm not sure what the American word for that is, so apologies for that.


	7. Treasure Hunt part 2

As soon as her companion vanished, Morgan ducked back behind the crates. Experience had taught her that waiting was what often led to more difficulties down the road, like an empty oxygen tank or dead crew members. 

On the other hand, it wasn't as if she had a time limit this time. What she had told her companion was true, Alex Yu was stranded somewhere in between time and space, but from what little she understood of the Outsider's explanations, Alex was in some kind of stasis. 

The Outsider had told her "your brother fell victim to his own games, trying to to achieve that which you could not, even at the risk of his own life. He lives, for now, and if you do not free him, he shall live forever; stranded in a space between seconds, in that fancy suit of his. Gun in one hand, a poisonous sound bomb in the other."

Morgan had recorded those words, albeit somewhat by accident. If she had know that her TranScribe was on, she would not have yelled like a little girl when the Outsider suddenly appeared before her.

"Curse the plague and this bloody curfew ! How's a man supposed to make a living ?" A voice pulled Morgan out of her reverie.

Although she had gotten used to always being alert back on Talos I, it was harder to stay focus outdoors in a town full of people, guards and weeping plague victims. Mondain noises of water splashing against rocks or rats squealing in the shadows often covered up fotsteps and muffled talking.

Hastily, almost instinctively even, Morgan 'mimicked' the nearest stray object. That just happened to be another empty wine bottle.

"Well now, Mr. Prattchet, even a wealthy man like you needs the city watch. Gangs are cutting throats and smashing windows left and right, and the weepers, excuse me, plague victims are worse." A second male voice responded.

Morgan, now alike to a bottle in all visual aspects, rolled from behind her crates to take a look at the two men chatting in front of her hiding spot.

One was a city guard and the other wore fancier clothing. A noble perhaps, Morgan thought. At his belt dangled a golden key. 

"Yes, what I have is indeed worth protecting." The man nodded. "It wasn't easy changing the combination on my safe, but now more than ever those details are what matters most."

The guard nodded and started walking towards the embankment.

"Nevertheless," Mr. Prattchet continued, "I am outreached at the treatment I've been given. I see no reason why Sokolov would refuse to see me." The noble man turned and started slowly following his companion.

Morgan, rolled behind them. She had the nagging suspicion that the house her companion wanted to beak into belonged to this man. Perhaps this Mr. Prattchet was a criminal, or perhaps that adjective was more fitting of the masked man. Either way, Morgan decided that he was a valuable ally, and that she would help him in any way she could.

Both men disappeared down a small staircase that led to a narrow strip of concrete by the water. Morgan followed them in her bottle-form. 

As they continued their conversation, she stopped 'mimicking' the bottle. With a limb made of a black gaz-like substance, she reached out for the golden key that hang from the man's belt. She snapped it away before taking the shape of a nearby brick.

The noble man stopped and looked around.

"Something wrong Mr. Pratchett ?" The guard asked.

"It's nothing." The other man replied after a few seconds. "I just felt a presence of sorts."

"Well with all that's going on, I wouldn't be surprised if ghosts and wraiths started wandering about our dear Dunwall." The guard shrugged.

"The city really did spiral into dissaray after the our dear Empress Jessamine was assassinated." Mr. Pratchett nodded and carried on walking.

'That empress of theirs again' Morgan thought. She had this uncanny feeling that something was wrong, just a tad out of place; a feeling of déjà vu. That man that she joined forces with, she had seen him somewhere before. But if the Outsider's words were to be believed, this was her first and only time in Dunwall.

A tickling feeling in her chest told Morgan that her psy energy was running out. She slid to the edge of the staircase before regaining her human form. She then crawled, as discreetly as her gear would allow, to the entrance of Mr. Pratchett's house. 

She looked around to make sure no other guards were present and carefully unlocked the door.


	8. Treasure Hunt part 3

The inside of the building was dark and smelled like mouldy wallpaper. Morgan reached out for her flashlight, but then decided against it. If she wasn't alone, then the light mighty attract unwanted attention.

She left the key in the keyhole, on the outer side of the door, and gently shut it closed. From what little light came through the tinted windows, Morgan could just about make out a desk on her left hand side and a set of drawers on her right.

'oh how much easier this snooping around would have been if they had computers here' Morgan thought. She picked up a notebook from the desk, with the appropriate amount of disinterest that a time-traveling alien scientist should hold towards the diary of some B-rank noble.

She flipped through it. The dimming light mashed most of the individual words together, but she still could make out some that were circled or drawn thicker than the rest. They read, in no particular order, 'shipment', 'whale', 'Delilah', 'void' and 'undying love'. 

"Right." Morgan sigh. A compilation of love poems was the last thing she needed.

The sound of shuffling fabric came from behind Morgan. She spun around, swinging her wrench at her eye level without even looking. A dull thump resonated through the small room, followed by the sound of a body flying into a wall. Morgan had already switched to the "phantom genesis" augment before fully realising what had happened.

As soon as she took a proper look at the battered plague victim before her, she switched her power to her default : "kinetic blast". With its impact, the body had hit ajar a door at the end of the hallway. Morgan kicked the now dead weeper asside before pushing the door open. She was too used to the sight of corpses to pay any mind to them.

The door led to a stairway leading upwards which Morgan followed. She stopped at the first floor as she heard the sound of mouvement coming from behind the wall. The sound stopped, and she held her breath. She told herself that it wasn't a mimic. It couldn't have been a mimic. Nor was it a phantom, not only because phantoms did not exist in this land, but also because they never made any efforts to be discreet.

Morgan considered calling out for her companion. Then the fact that she didn't actually know his name, or that he even identified as a man, hit her. 

The door at the end of the hallway creaked and Morgan readied her wrench for another hit. Instead, a familiar masked figure peaked through the door in what one might have mistakes for a discreet fashion.

"You scared the living hell out of me." Morgan said before putting her weapon away.

"I thought you understood when I told you to stay put." 

Corvo invited the woman into the room he had been "exploring".

"I thought I'd help." She shrugged before following him.

Corvo stopped in front of a heavy safe mounted onto one of the walls. He tweaked the wheels that displayed the combination. The safe did not open and Corvo hit it in frustration.

"I'm not one to judge, but you do realise this is robbery ?" Morgan asked. Not that she cared about stealing, but this habit that her companion had to loot ever nook and cranny had started to slow her down.

He turn to face her, his expression unreadable under his mask.

"If it can make you sleep better at night, I will only take the rune. I'll leave the money, if there is any." He said. 

He did not add "but just this one time", but he had thought it loud enough for Morgan to understand.

"Like I said, I'm not one to judge. So steal to your heart's content. I'll even help for the sake of us getting to Sokolov before tomorrow morning." Morgan approached the safe.

"There's probably a clue somewhere, I've noticed that two paintings had numbers scribbled on them." Corvo said before stepping asside.

"Right. As my brother would say; we're burning daylight so let's wrap this up." 

Morgan reached into her picket and pulled out a hairpin. She had used them to make her very stylish hairbun look neat before she realised that her Typhon biology allowed it to maintain its shape on its own.

During one of her simulations she had decided to learn lockpicking, so she wouldn't waste neuromods on hacking. That was before she had realised that her neuromod abilities were no longer reset between each run.

She tested which digit wheel was most loose and slid the hairpin in the crack between it and the door itself. In a matter of seconds, she managed to unhinge the lock and the safe door creaked open.

"Shitty security, if I say so myself." Morgan said with a smile.

Inside the safe laid a stack of papers, weighted down by a carved piece of rock. 

"Is this this rune of yours ?" Morgan handed Corvo the carved whalebone.

He nodded. 

"I need one more of those to improve my, um, magic skill." Corvo was about to say 'possession' but he stopped himself just in time.

"Wait, so they work like neuromods ? How do you administer them ?"

"Administer ?"

"Yes, how do you improve your skills ? Do you eat them or crush them into powder ?" Morgan realised how silly her words were as soon as she said them, but the excitement of having something that had potential similarities with her area of expertise took the better of her.

"Forget what I just said," she continued, "that doesn't make any sense. You said magic, so it means you use the Void as a medium, right ? That you somehow transfer energy from that stone to the void and then to yourself, which is fascinating when you think about the biophysical implications of that. I mean, we have tried for decades to transfer enthalpy like this, and the way you 'upgrade' certain abilities, I can only assume it's similar to how neuromods work, but instead of rewriting your neural pathways, the rune rewrites the way energy moves through your body-"

Corvo pressed his palm against Morgan's forehead.   
"Do you have a fever?" He asked.

Her face turned red and she smacked his hand away.

"Nevermind, let's keep moving." Morgan pushed passed the man towards an open balcony window.

"Can you teleport while carrying other people?" She asked, mainly to change the subject.

"Yes. The issue at hand is the arc pylon on the other side of this block." Corvo answered after a few seconds of thought.

"What do you mean ?" Morgan hadn't heard that term before, but something told her it was another sub-cathegory of turrets.

"Another invention of Sokolov. A lethal defense mechanism that is is triggered when one comes within a certain radious of it." Corvo explained. "I scouted the area ahead, but there is no way around it, unless you're up for a swim."

"Hmmm." Morgan thought for a bit. If it were indeed another type of turrets, she could immobilise it for a while, if they weren't of course an elevated and highly mobile sniper tower.   
"Those arc pylons, are they bound to the ground ?" She finally asked.

"Yes. And you can throw as much whale oil at them as you want, they won't budge."

"In that case I could block it for a few seconds. If they're anything like the turret where I'm from, we'll have plenty of time to run past." 

Morgan turned away from the window through which she had been studying the street below. 

"I suggest the following, if you can get me within let's say 100 meters of the thing, I'll cover it with GLOOO and you'll teleport us past. Does your ability have a cool down period ?"

"No, it doesn't." Corvo answered he was torn about asking what GLOOO was. He would have done so, had he not already made up his mind about the mental state of his companion.

"Then shall we go?"

"Yes we shall."

Corvo awkwardly lifted Morgan over his shoulder. With his left fist, he aimed his 'blink' at the opposite roof.

**Author's Note:**

> if you want to read more of this story, head to fanfiction.net ;)


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